Queen of Time
by Janiqua
Summary: Just a short little fantasy of how The Sound of Drums might have ended. The Master turned the TARDIS into a paradox machine, so why can't the TARDIS make its own paradox, pulling a certain young woman from the um... past... er... um... future? Spoilers!


**Author's Note:** Excuse me while I daydream. I know perfectly well this can't happen, didn't happen, and wouldn't happen in a million years, but then again, the Doctor _can_ travel in time, so you never know… Anyway, this is how I handle stress when all I really want to do is pull out my hair in anxiety. Like I said, it can't happen, but that's why we have fanfiction.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Doctor Who! I'm not sure you'd like it if I did…

**Spoilers:** For The Sound of Drums…

**ooooooo**

"So! _Earthlings_…" The contempt was all but dripping from his voice like poisoned honey. "Basically… um… end of the world." Everything about him screamed of arrogance and conceit. The Master. Harold Saxon. Professor Yana. Whatever the hell he called himself, Martha hated him. She hated him for what he had done to the Doctor, she hated him for what he had done to Jack, she hated him for what he had done to her family, and she hated him for what he meant to do to the planet. _Her_ planet.

Standing on the stairs with his wife, Lucy Saxon, directly to his right, surrounded by the mysterious floating Toclafane, the Master held up his laser screwdriver, activating it with a triumphant shout. "HERE! COME! THE! DRUMS!"

_"Here come the drums, here come the drums!"_

The upbeat, lively music that suddenly resounded throughout the meeting room horrified Martha even while humiliating her. That this was what the Master would listen to while conquering all of humanity seemed degrading and gave her yet another reason to despise him – and not only him, but his wife as well. She was just standing there dancing like a complete idiot while the Master ran towards a window to watch as the sky overhead tore itself apart into an enormous crimson rift from which six billion Toclafane descended.

Jack had told her to teleport out, but how could she leave? The Doctor wasn't even capable of supporting himself anymore, and so she held him up as she had always held him in the short amount of time that they'd known each other. He was scared; she could feel him trembling. How was she supposed to abandon him now when he needed her more than ever before?

_"You are my voodoo child, my voodoo child!"_

At that moment, the music stopped.

It just stopped and outside the Toclafane all froze as if time itself had come to a standstill. Martha gasped, glancing at Jack – who was still lying half stunned on the ground – but he could only shrug upon meeting her gaze.

"What?" The Master spun away from the window, scratching his head with a truly baffled look on his face. As much as Martha hated to admit it, he almost reminded her of the Doctor. "That's odd." He turned towards his literally ancient rival, who stared back up at him quite blankly while taking several deep, even breaths. "What did you do this time?"

"He did nothing."

The voice was strangely beautiful, like nothing Martha had ever heard before, and it was coming from right behind her. The Master and his wife both glanced up, the Doctor fought to turn around – and Martha was quick to assist him – while Jack, the rest of the Jones' family, and everyone else in the room all twisted their heads to stare at the door in pure, unbridled astonishment.

A girl was standing there. A girl, maybe nineteen or twenty years old, but positively inhuman. She was like an angel bathed in golden radiance; her eyes were the color of the sun. Dressed in black pants and a red top, her clothes were definitely from Earth, but when she spoke, she sounded like a Goddess. "It was me."

Jack sat up sharply. "ROSE!"

Martha's jaw dropped even as the Doctor started shaking. He had aged so much that, had he been human, the shock he no doubt felt now might have killed him. "But that's not possible!" Rose Tyler was trapped in a parallel world; she couldn't be here! Especially not like this!

The Master narrowed his eyes while lifting up his chin. "Who are you?"

"I am the Bad Wolf," she spoke in a melodic voice that could almost be described as tranquil. Francine, Clive, and Tish Jones all backed away from her, much to their captors' relief, and within seconds no one stood between her and the Master whatsoever. Slowly, she held up her arm and extended it out towards the Doctor. "I see the whole of time and space…" Warm, golden light washed over him. Martha caught her breath, turning just in time to watch as his age and frailty melted away. He became young again, strong and rejuvenated, but despite that, the look of sheer terror on his face did not change.

The Master's brow furrowed and he took several steps towards the girl while regarding his prisoner in open perplexity. "Now isn't this interesting?"

"Rose…" the Doctor scrambled to his feet, torn between facing his companion fully and keeping a sharp eye on his greatest enemy. Martha stood up as well, but very slowly, unable to tear her gaze away from the resplendent apparition of her legendary predecessor. "Rose, you can't be here. Not like this." He almost started shouting in what sounded quite like panic. "You can't be doing this, Rose, not again!"

"It isn't again," she stated calmly, her glowing eyes growing brighter with each and every word. "Even now, I stand before the Dalek Emperor and his army." She glanced at the Doctor, though barely turning her head. "But the TARDIS hurts. I can feel her pain and there is much of it. It's unbearable!" No. Her glowing eyes only _seemed_ to be growing brighter because they were shining with silent tears.

"That's the Time Vortex, isn't it?" Jack glanced urgently from Rose back to the Doctor. "You said she absorbed it on Satellite Five and that's what caused my resurrection and your regeneration!" Martha had no idea what that meant, but she heard and recognized its considerable significance.

"Is it, now?" The Master looked hungrily from Jack to Rose and then to the Doctor, who seemed utterly paralyzed in fear of the great and yet terrible beauty standing before him. "Shall history repeat itself, then?"

"It will not," Rose whispered, though loudly enough for everyone in the room to hear. "You cannibalized the TARDIS, Time Lord." She stared straight at the Master, who glanced back at her sharply. "You constructed for yourself a paradox machine, but the TARDIS abhors you. And to stop you, she exploited that machine to create a paradox of her own that summoned me here."

The Doctor looked stung. "So you're not…?" He choked on his words, unable to finish, and Martha realized he had hoped that somehow Rose had found her way back to him. And for the first time, she thought she understood why… Rose was looking at the Doctor now with such devotion in her golden eyes that it truly broke Martha's heart.

"I know your face," she asserted. "I've seen it. As I see all things." The tears in her eyes were starting to fall. "I'm waiting for your kiss. The paradox won't last, Doctor. The TARDIS must heal and the rift must close so I can finish what I started and end the Time War."

"The Time War doesn't end with you," the Doctor clutched Martha's arm because he needed her to anchor him or else he might not have been able to restrain himself. His hearts were begging him to charge forward and pull Rose into a tight embrace, but if he did that… Gallifrey had always had laws to prevent paradoxes. Nothing was more dangerous… He dared not touch her and yet he couldn't… he couldn't… "Rose, don't go back. Stay here with me."

The Master scoffed. "How pathetically touching."

Martha glared at him before looking back at Rose. She had so much power, so much grace, was it any wonder why no one else in the entire universe could compete with her? She was beautiful… beyond words, beyond all measure! And Martha understood for the first time, she truly understood, just how much the Doctor had lost that day at Canary Wharf.

"The Toclafane fall," Rose quietly declared, holding up her arm. And sure enough, the few onboard the _Valiant_, as well as the billions in the sky outside, each divided into trillions of golden particles that dissolved into nothing. Lucy Saxon shrieked at the sight of it even as the Master's face darkened angrily. Jack, Martha, and the rest of her family all glanced at the Time Lord nervously, but the Doctor and Rose hardly seemed to notice. Something was distracting them. Pain, from the look on Rose's face. She lowered her head, staring at the floor as if scared and confused. "I had a dream. I heard a voice and it was calling my name." She slowly looked back up at the Doctor. "Bad Wolf Bay."

He shook his head. "Rose, don't…" There was so much anguish in his eyes.

"The rift closes," she said, her voice trembling. "The world does not end." She glanced at the Master. "The drums grow silent." And then… her golden eyes fell towards Martha. Martha, who had been starting to wonder whether or not she'd been born with a perception filter around her neck. "Save him."

The words were startling, but as Martha gazed into Rose's eyes, she saw more than she would have thought possible… and she understood. The Bad Wolf was a paradox. She didn't belong here and would soon return to wherever it was she had come from. But the fight wasn't over yet. Rose had stopped the Toclafane, but she could not stop the Master, because he wasn't a part of the paradox. But he was tiny. Rose's words, not Martha's. He was ever so tiny.

"Thank you," she whispered, realizing quite suddenly that she had just been entrusted with the most precious individual the entire universe had ever known by a girl who might as well have been the Queen of Time herself. Rose Tyler… She was counting on Martha now… and Martha wouldn't dare let her down.

**ooooooo**

**A/N:** So, yeah… A nice little fantasy that helps calm my nerves as I wait anxiously for the next episode. Hey, leave a review and tell me what you think!


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